Kaya (Coconut Jam)

Hmm.. Kaya, one of the most famous bread spread in Malaysia. In Ipoh, you can find most of the old style Kopitiam serving homemade kaya toast with Ipoh white coffee in the morning especially at the old town area. I believe it is now become one of the tradition where you can find kaya toast in every Kopitiam in Malaysia.
Kaya reminded me a lot of old time memory. Still remember that my mom used to make kaya all the time when we were teen. She used to prepare kaya toast as our breakfast before we go to school in the early morning. To us, mommy's homemode kaya is the best. Of course during her era, making kaya was not as easy as today. I still remembered that my mom's kaya was cook using the double boiler with fresh ingredients on the charcoal burner. Fresh ingredients mean fresh squeeze coconut milk with the egg from my mom's little chicken farm. Can you imagine how good that is?
In my mind, cooking kaya is such a hassle work and I would never imagine cooking my own kaya until I found blogs talking about cooking kaya with bread machine, slow cooker or even the modern style rice cooking with multifunction. Now that I am able bake some fresh bread for my family, next goal will be cooking a nice kaya to eat with the lovely loaf.

Here's the recipe I used where from LCOM, adapted from Jo's deli.


Ingredients:

• 3 large eggs
• 1 1/3 cup sugar
• 300 ml thick coconut milk
• 1/2 tsp. clear pandan paste ( you can use any green pandan paste as well)

Method:

• In a bowl, lightly beat the eggs until mix well
• Put everything including add into bread machine
• Set the machine to Jam function and let it do the rest of the job
• The kaya will not look smooth after the cooking from the machine. Pour the kaya to a blender and blend until smooth
  

* When fresh from the blender, the kaya may not look as thick. Don't worry, it will get thicker as it cold down.

Since i was using the clear pandan flavor as oppose to the green pandan paste, I was surprise to see that the kaya actually looks quite greenish. Now, after storing it in the fridge, the kaya is now look more yellowish which is what i expect.

If i remember correctly, the brownish color from the traditional kaya were come from the caramel where you will have to prepare right before the kaya is ready and stir the hot caramel into the kaya mixture until well mix. Not only it gave the brownish color of the kaya but it also add extra caramel kick to it. I was so tempting to try the caramel steps but afraid i will mess up the whole kaya without consult to my mom. Until then, this is definitely one great recipe to keep.
aahh.. who want some fresh bake milk loaf with some kaya and butter on it? Me!! Now that I pass my glucose test.. I can finally indulge my lovely loaf and kaya without any guilt or worry :)